


Nightshade

by frangipani



Series: Halloween [6]
Category: Star Wars Legends - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, Halloween Challenge, a pretty good team grudgingly, a wholesome adventure in coruscant's undercity ahahaha, coruscant wierdness, luke skywalker's implacable goodness, mara is a professional
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-28
Updated: 2018-10-28
Packaged: 2019-08-08 14:31:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,698
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16431224
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/frangipani/pseuds/frangipani
Summary: Shortly after moving to Coruscant, a mysterious lightsaber comes into Luke's possession. Luke really wants to know where it came from...even if it leads him into the bowels of city where all sorts of dangers lurk.





	Nightshade

**Author's Note:**

> Aaaaaaa why do they keep getting LONGER (and harder to write)?? Many many thanks to [strangeallure](https://archiveofourown.org/users/strangeallure/pseuds/strangeallure) who plotted with me, and held my hand, and pointed out issues, and was generally a rockstar who finished her challenge before me!
> 
> This is Halloween challenge #4. Blah blah I don't pay attention to the specifics of canon timelines, or Legends-Nu Canon purity. Editing is minimal. No gore, but unpleasant stuff abounds. Reader discretion is advised. Happy Halloween everyone!
> 
> Mini playlist [here](https://playmoss.com/es/song/guard-pineapple-crush/1108217/playlists)

6 ABY

“No, take it from me, Jedi. You don’t want to talk to her,” Hizoo said, gesticulating languidly, like he didn't care either way. “She’s...she doesn’t have what you’d call a sparkling personality.”

Luke shook his head. “This was a _lightsaber_ , I need to know where your contact got it from.”

He stared at the Weequay broker, the manager, he’d been told, of a veritable army of scavengers. He probably shouldn’t sound this eager. Han had warned him specifically about undercity hucksters. The new guys like us, like you, are the hustle, he’d said. I know you’re desperate to dig into Jedi stuff, but it’s just been a few months. Best to orient yourself first.

Luke was tired of orienting himself.

“One would think you’d be happy just to have it,” Hizoo objected. “Is greed the Jedi way?”

Luke tamped on the urge to roll his eyes at the lecture on the pitfalls of greed from an _underworld broker_. “No, but the pursuit of knowledge is.” He hadn’t needed to be in Coruscant long to figure out that credits oiled everyone here too. In the margins of the city, the differences between the Core and the Outer Rim were almost nonexistent.He leaned forward. “I need--”

“No meet,” Hizoo countered.

Luke had also enough experience in negotiation to sniff out a soft no from a hard no. You don’t offer a lightsaber to a Jedi, currently the only one around, and not expect a polite comm back -- even if you involved a broker. “I’m not going to ask about her background, just--”

Hizoo looked at him skeptically. “How we do things down here is not how you do things up there. You pay me, you get what my people find, but that’s it.”

Luke made his tone appeasing. “All I want is one meeting, and she’s not obligated to tell me anything about herself. But I want to know where she found the lightsaber. It’s important.”

“My people are scavengers, Jedi. Where is always a loaded question. Trade secrets and such.”

“Exactly. I’ll pay you double what I paid as the finder’s fee. And she'll get a separate payment.”

Hizoo cocked his head. “No.”

“Triple.”

“You don’t understand. You can’t find someone who’ll nose around the industrial sector. Too many stories about crawling things. Besides what kind of broker would I be if I sold off my people like this? ”

“A rich one,” Luke said flatly. “I won’t go higher than triple. Set up a meeting. Tell her she can wear a mask and a vocalizer. I don’t care who she is.”

“She won’t do it. None of my people will.”

Luke attempted another tack. “So now it’s you who can’t keep your people in line?”

Hizoo made a scratching sound from the back of his throat. “Baiting now, Master Jedi? I would think that beneath you.”

“I don’t want to stop buying from you--”

“A threat now?”

With some impatience, he added, “I need to know where the lightsaber came from, Hizoo. It’s not a triviality to me. It’s not a trinket. You and your contact stand to gain plenty here. Or I can be on my way. Your choice.”

After a tense silence, Hizoo said, “She’ll vanish.” 

“Maybe she will,” Luke conceded. “But maybe she won’t. That’s none of your concern anymore. What does she go by? You have a name for her?”

The Weeqway's lip curled. “Not one I'd give out.”

Luke passed him an exasperated look, and the Weequay laughed. “But she responds to Green Eyes quick enough.”

\--

An hour later, Luke stepped out of his skimmer into an area with crumbling walls and dirty signposts warnings of biohazard. The Works. Coruscant’s former industrial area. 

Luke had never been -- apart from his general duties mainly in the Senate and Temple districts, there had been no reason to. The skirmishes during the Liberation hadn’t touched this area, but it looked war-torn, regardless. He stepped over the aged duracrete into a open area broken up by towering warehouses, their facades in near the same state of disrepair as the wall that marked off the area. All of it was bathed in the glare of red floodlights mounted on gargantuan posts. Beyond them he could see the swirling lights of the traffic above like shooting stars.

Decades ago, when companies had moved their facilities elsewhere, they’d left nothing but derelict buildings and the threat of hazardous waste leaks, was one of the few tidbits of information he remembered. After the hustle and bustle of nearly every other area in Coruscant, the silence and emptiness of the Works had Luke looking around, discomfited.

It wasn’t only his desolate surroundings, the empty warehouses with their dilapidated duracrete and cracked panes. Luke trudged along, the sound of gravel loud under his feet. More concerning was the cloying malice all around the area like a rank stench, blanketing his awareness. The Works, he had no doubt, had been a site for great evil once.

Which meant his own Jedi senses were far from clear. Luke stopped and gave another scan, reached further through the Force. With a minimum of concentration he could break through the atmosphere. Like the pieces of duracrete at his feet and the rusted signs, the dark side aura was something of the past. A thick stain, but just a stain.

That didn’t make it more pleasant. His misgivings returned. He could leave, Luke thought. He probably should leave. Hizoo had been adamant his associate wouldn’t be happy he’d given her up for an impromptu meeting. Maybe his insistence had been excessive. 

But there was the lightsaber he’d received only two days ago. Luke had studied it ceaselessly. There’d been no focusing crystal in it, which was enough of an enigma. Very few knew how to take a lightsaber apart, so it must have been found without it. Shorter than the one that he’d made, or the lightsaber he’d lost at Bespin, this lightsaber hilt was much lighter. The parts that comprised it were basic, not quite as basic as his, but certainly more so than his old blade. It barely had a choke point-- the thinner area where the dominant hand rested to give the user flexibility for its wield. This had been a priority in the schematics he’d found in Ben’s journal. If Luke didn’t know better, he’d have thought it was a training lightsaber, made for someone who hadn’t mastered advanced sequences. Perhaps a youngling, given the smaller size. It very well could be, but he wouldn’t know. 

That was the problem in a nutshell. When he’d first arrived at Coruscant, he’d thought he’d find out more about the Old Order. The Jedi Temple had once stood here, before the Emperor gutted it. Surely something had to have remained. Luke had held hope finding a treasure trove of old texts -- texts like Ben’s journal, which had given step by step instructions on building a lightsaber. There had to be, he’d thought, a wealth of information to guide him on the history and practices of the Old Order. A wealth of information that could make the task of recreating it less daunting.

Luke had found nothing. Nothing in the cavernous spaces of the Palace, and only hearsay and rumors in the Temple district. Months in, frustration had begun to creep in on him. Whatever Palpatine had taken from the Jedi, he’d either destroyed or moved elsewhere. Worse, there was no shortage of charlatans and swindlers happy to waste his time. Maybe it was him, he'd started thinking. He was too much of a novice Jedi, and lacked the sensitivity to track the material. He had no business even imagining starting up a new order. No use dreaming of passing on what he'd learned. It was too paltry.

The lightsaber was real though.

And perhaps it heralded more. He had to believe that. Luke turned his thoughts to his immediate surroundings, passing by beams and fuel drums gathered in one corner. That dark side aura might actually be a good thing. Palpatine could have easily brought Jedi artifacts and materials here. The Works would be a perfect location to hide things, based on what he’d read. This place as a whole was closer to the lower levels, but unlike the densely populated lower levels of the city center, the Works were surrounded by an extensive underground ghost town, abandoned even before the Works came to be, as the denizens opted to move away into surrounding areas less likely to be subjected to pollution. 

This underground ghost town was where he’d been told Green Eyes, the woman who’d found the lightsaber, was “working” -- digging around for material to bring back to Hizoo. The name was a bit much, he'd thought. Why anyone would feed into holodrama cliches was beyond him. The actual scavenging was par for the course. The Liberation of Coruscant had created all sorts of markets for those willing to go into places residents of the higher levels wouldn’t dream setting foot into. 

Hizoo had given him Green Eyes’ location through a mapping program he used, as he put it, to keep tabs on his associates. It was software that beamed up a three dimensional holo from his datapad, a red dot indicating Green Eyes’ location along with key landmarks. Luke consulted it now for the nearest turbolift to the lower levels.

The route took him between a couple of warehouses to a crumbling circular structure, which differed little from its counterpart at the edges of the city centers, save for its emptiness. Portals, the locals, called them, and Luke had yet to find one that looked inviting, though the construction was prodigiously stable. The ones Luke was familiar with always had masses of beings congregating around it, selling all sorts of goods, and offering their services as guides. 

Not this one though. Luke called the turbolift, and its doors instantly opened. He walked into the wide car and checked the map again. Hizoo’s contact was about seventy stories below. Luke pressed the button. His ears popped as the turbolift descended. 

The descent gave him enough time to wonder about the crawling things Hizoo had spoken of. That was normal too. There was no shortage of stories of underground monstrosities, most revolving around a four-legged animal called a cthon. His mind latched onto the clang of machinery as the turbolift continued its descent with several mechanical _ga-tonks_.

The turbolift stopped with a lurch, and the _ga-tonk_ only got louder as the doors opened. Luke strode out into a narrow, cramped passageway, wiring visible above him, the lights around this part blared a garish orange, even more irritating than the red above. Unline the higher level, nothing other than the serpentine wires were visible above him. Coruscant’s undercity as a whole was actually a haphazard conglomeration of platforms one built on top of another, the energy to each routed along a dense, labyrinthine arrangement of wiring. 

Luke continued following the map. Like upstairs, there was no one in sight. From a distance he could occasionally hear scrabbling sounds on metal, probably animals in search of food. 

Not a cthon though. The creature was obviously a conglomeration of people’s biggest fears around this area: a contaminated mutation with cadaverous skin, no eyes, and teeth it used to gruesomely rip its victims apart. Or worse.

Some said they used to be sentient once. Bipedal. Now they just crawled.

Luke shook his head, and focused on the landscape around him. Unlike the areas in the lower levels he’d been to, no discarded wrapping and food on lay on the ground, though there was plenty of debris, pieces of duraplast, sheets of plasteel, and discarded tubing he had to step over. Most of it might not even have been from the immediate surroundings but left by scavengers as they rummaged around for materials to sell. The smell here was different too, a faintly metallic rank, instead of the mix of an assortment of street food and crowded beings of various species. As he walked through the passageway the sides periodically opened up to abandoned storefronts with dirty signage and more spacious mall areas. A testament, Luke guessed, to how the district had bustled, probably well before the Clone Wars. The path narrowed once more. 

He should call out from enough distance not to scare her, he thought. The atmosphere here was enough for anyone to be vigilant. Then again, this was her job. Maybe she was more used to it. 

He stopped to withdraw his datapad and consult the map, resuming the route around a bend to an an area without any storefronts or doors. The red dot blinked there, closer, just a little below him to the right. There was nothing there though. Was the map wrong?

Luke examined the wall beside him, eyes landing on an tiny open hatch with an access panel inside. This should be what the woman had found. He pushed at the access panel to find she’d stripped the housing, leaving the motherboard behind it on display. This meant there was some hidden door here on this wall. She’d probably hotwired it. 

And sure enough, there were two wires, plastic jackets peeled back. Luke touched them together, and with a labored hydraulic hiss a door just a couple of feet from him slid open to a darkened space.

Luke stepped inside, a bit of apprehension at the utter darkness of the place mingling with relief. He could clearly sense the woman nearer now. He took out a small glowrod from his belt and shone it around the room.

Inset shelving lined the walls, packed with a collection of gallon-sized bottles, and a darkened opening lay a few feet away. He shone his light on one of the bottles. Cleaning solution. Dusty, but not as old looking as he expected from an area used before the Clone Wars. A supply closet. Luke stared back at the door. Why would a hidden door lead to a supply closet?

He looked back at the door behind him, now closed. A hidden entrance. To where? What was this place? He checked the map again. Looked like the woman was downstairs on a lower floor.

The Force wasn’t blaring alarm. Luke continued out to a corridor. Some wide doors were to his left, the glass smudged and too dirty to look through, so he cautiously went in. Long tables stood before a serving counter. A mess hall?

Had this been a dormitory of some sort? Why was there a door from the outside that opened to a supply closet? 

Luke followed the corridor, down to a turbolift. He stood in front of it with a vague wariness. While portals were safe, turbolifts inside old buildings were another story. He swung the glowrod and found another set of doors at the end, a stairwell. Much better.

As Luke went down the stairs, he stopped at the landing to consult the map. The woman was on this level. The Force confirmed it, only the murkiness of the dark side made the presence he felt blurry and indistinct.

“Hello?” he called. “Hello?” He winced at the loud, metallic echo of his words.

He hoped that it was better to announce himself -- and that it wouldn’t make her run. He’d rather not chase anyone down here. Luke could almost hear Yoda chiding him about his lack of patience. He could have waited to approach her when she was done and emerged from the area. Then again, Hizoo only knew his associates’ location when they were working -- who knew if he'd get another chance to speak with her if he waited.

Just the lightsaber, he thought. Even if she weren't thrilled he'd approached her, he’d make it worth her while.

He tried the first door to his right, entering the level’s communal ‘fresher. His glowrod’s beam illuminated crumbling washbasins, tiles cracked all around them, and a narrow line of six open showers, nozzles drawing grasping shapes when the beam of the glowrod hit them. Communal ‘freshers. An open doorway lay past them. He looked at the map. The red dot blinked in close proximity. He put his datapad away.

The doorway led to a dressing area about as big as the showers, broken into aisles by rusted metal shelving units. The glowrod illuminated a humanoid shape, and he jerked back. Luke drew in a breath, instantly embarrassed when a closer look identified the shape as tattered clothes hanging on a rack.

He approached. A uniform? Orange with numbers along the back. They looked like --

Luke felt a prickle from the Force and half turned, the glowrod’s light passing through the lockers. Nothing. Yet he sensed clearly that a presence was close. The cloud of the dark side still made it difficult to sense with any sort of specificity though.

“Green Eyes?” he called. “I’m Luke Skywalker. I mean you no harm.” Thinking it over he added, “I got your information from Hizoo.”

He waited. From a distance he heard something. It sounded like...banging. 

Luke checked the map again. The dot was moving out of the room he was in. Was that causing the banging? 

“Green Eyes?” he called again.

The banging continued, but Luke couldn’t pick out more than it occurring at some distance. Outside the room he was at. Luke crossed the room, shining his glowrod to and fro between the shelves and lockers until he found an exit at the other end, his footsteps thumping against the duracrete. The banging had stopped.

A corridor. He paused. The opening to the communal ‘fresher had to be several yards down to his right, which meant he should go left. He walked a few paced before clipping his glowrod to his wrist and whipping out his datapad. The dot was still moving. End of the hall, he thought. Okay. He put the datapad away.

“Green Eyes? I’m--”

BAM BAM.

He darted away, heart in his mouth as the banging continued. He drew the glowrod in the direction of the noise. 

The wall itself seemed to shake from the bam. Through the wall!

Luke’s back hit the opposite side, his heart at his throat. What the hell?

Door, he realized a second later as a small door came into view -- supply closet. And a frightened being inside. He could sense them, once he'd calmed himself down. A wide metal bar jammed across the door kept it from opening. Luke cleared it off, noting it wasn’t that heavy, and the door burst open, a figure nearly careening onto him if his reflexes hadn’t made him take a step back. 

The figure did claw at his tunic, then let go just as suddenly. “There’s something here,” a distinctly female voice gasped out, words tumbling into each other. “I don’t have my glowrod--” She paused and he got the sense she was making him out in the gloom. 

“Wait, wait, why?” He asked, feeling his face scrunch up. His glowrod was aimed at the floor and he raised it up a little. She covered her face and jerked around.

“Don’t point that thing at my face,” she snapped.

“You’re Green Eyes?” he asked, quickly dropping the light, and plowed on. “I’m--”

“I know who you are, Jedi. That dirt bag couldn’t help himself, could he?” Hizoo, he pieced. 

“I offered him credits, and I’d like to...extend that offer to you as well. For infor--”

“Shut up," she hissed. 

The vehemence of it made him quiet. A thumping sound came from the end of the corridor, and Luke automatically raised the glowrod in that direction, his other inching to his lightsaber. Only duracrete and the walls of the corridor. A few beats passed in total silence.

“You said there’s something here,” Luke ventured quietly.

“Took my things. Including my glowrod." He had the sense there was embarrassment under her wariness as she tapped her forearm. "I'd rather be gone before it comes back. Hizoo gave you a map of my location?”

Luke nodded though he wasn’t sure Green Eyes could see. “Maybe it’s best if we go into one of the rooms to look at it. There’s a dressing area just over there.” He gestured behind them.

“That’s where I was clubbed. All those shelves provide extremely convenient hiding spaces.” 

The thumping sound didn’t give him much confidence staying out in the open, even if the Force still didn't raise alarm. He hadn't even properly sensed Green Eyes, and right now, the glowrod’s light didn’t even reach the end of the corridor.

“There has to be somewhere else then. Over here.” Luke started walking, Green Eyes following reluctantly. He hadn’t been expecting a warm welcome, but this had been a bit...brusque. Well past unhappy to be found, she radiated a deep hostility. Certainly more than he’d expect from someone he’d just _rescued_. Much more.

He shone a light into another door, larger than the closet’s and opened it before he could think of it too much. The room it opened to was scarcely larger than the supply closet. The light of the glowrod passed through the legs of a cot. The space had nothing in it other than that, just the musty smell of stagnant air. He shut the door.

“Bring up the map,” Green Eyes ordered, and he clipped his glowrod to his wrist while he fished for the datapad. She all but yanked it out of his hands.

“What is this place anyway?” He watched as she examined the holomap, inputting commands to zoom into a particular area. The red spot blinked at a corner of the map. It was still moving.

The red spot was supposed to be Green Eyes.

She grunted, as the map zoomed out. “Detention center.”

His eyes were stuck to the red spot. “A detention center under the Works? For whom?”

“I don’t know." She didn't raise her head from the map.

“Separatists?”

At that, Green Eyes looked up, the shadows drawing surreal shapes on her face. He couldn’t really make out her features. “Separatists?" she scoffed. "No, this was an Imperial detention center.”

He felt himself grow cold. “An Imperial detention center,” he repeated. A hidden one. Swallowing, he pointed at the red spot still moving some distance from them. “I thought that was you.”

There was a second of silence and Green Eyes said, “That’s the locator Hizoo placed with my things.” They both watched the red spot continue moving. “That’s where that creature is.”

Green Eyes handed the datapad back and he put it away. “There’s stairwells at every corner and we’re midway to the next one. So we--” She suddenly teetered, her hand pressing against her forehead. 

Luke reached over to stabilize her, but she darted away, her back thudding against the wall. “What is it? Are you okay?” She didn’t answer for a moment and a knot of dread wound in his gut. How badly was she hurt?

“Fine,” she squeezed out, hunched over. “Just--just a headache.”

“Okay.” He reached out with the Force to scan her, thinking he should have done that when he found her. “Okay.” If she had some sort of head injury--

She all but threw herself back against the wall again. “Don’t!” Her voice was shaky when she continued, "Whatever you were going to do, don't.

“Alright, alright.” He raised his hands and gestured to the cot. “Why don’t you just sit--” He shone the glowrod on the cot, noting it had sheets, arranged in a strange lumpy shape. 

Luke took a step back and gasped. Not a sheet.

Green Eyes was still standing by the opposite wall, her head bowed and he kept his voice level, tamping on his revulsion. “We should go. Now.” He went to the door, opened it, and pulled on Green Eye’s arm.

“Don’t touch me.” She yanked her arm back. “Don't kriffing ever --” 

“There’s a body in that room." He strode down the corridor, scarcely thinking. It’d been humanoid in form. He had the impression of a desiccated face, hollowed out and skull-like, the sheet more like a makeshift shroud. He didn’t want to think about it. Just get far away.

“A what?” She jogged to keep up as he retraced their steps back past the supply closet and into the dressing room area. 

“Covered with the sheet. I don’t think it was...recent.”

“That thing dragged it there? The way it dragged me into the supply closet?”

A big wail of alarms tore through the air, and Luke shone the glowrod around them. “What’s going on now?”

“That’s the lockdown mechanism.” She shut her eyes tight. He sensed fear, which was normal enough, but there was something else as she pressed her hand to her forehead again, clearly in pain. "Sentient."

“Stay away from me." She darted back.

Luke stared at her outline warily, stopping when he realized he’d approached. Was he stuck in an abandoned Imperial detention cell in the lower levels with a woman suffering from a traumatic head injury? While something else was hunting them?

Luke drew some calm into himself, forcing himself to stop and breathe. First thing’s first.

“Are you alright?” he forced himself to ask evenly. “You just said we need to get out of here, and there’s something--”

Green Eyes shoved herself upright. “It’s just...a headache. All that blaring made it worse.” Even by glowrod the cast of her features looked drawn. “I’m more -- I’m more worried about being locked in. That thing knows what it’s doing. Bodies all over this place." She exhaled sharply "Terrible kriffing idea. Kriff." She looked around. He had the feeling she was talking to herself, but her gaze returned to him, even if by the diffused light of the glowrod, he still couldn’t see her face too clearly. “And you took us right back where it attacked me. Maybe you want it to finish the job?”

“I didn't know." He shone his glowrod around the dressing area, shaking off the sharpness of her tone and her animosity. "But we have the map and it wasn't close. It won’t surprise us again,” he went for soothing though the way Green Eyes felt, he doubted it’d make a difference. Things weren’t all that dire from where he stood, even without the map, he had the Force as warning. The atmosphere of the area though, mingled with Green Eyes' hostility. She felt like she'd like nothing more than for the creature to show up and attack _him_. Luke went back towards the door. She _had_ been attacked and left caged. This might just be an overflow of all that.

Green Eyes shook her head. “Doesn’t have to.” Her voice sounded steadier, he told himself. She was making sense and was walking, he cataloged. All good signs. “Lockdown means all entrances and exits to all rooms are sealed. It’s sentient for sure.”

Luke swallowed and went for his lightsaber. “Then it’s a good thing we’re leaving it behind.” He activated his blade and plunged it into the door. 

The lightsaber shorted out.

Luke stared at it for a second. He tried it again with the same result. “What is this? Why--”

“Disabling tech for lightsabers.” Her voice was dismissive, almost casual enough to feel off for some reason. “Try a blaster. Maybe that--”

“I don’t carry a blaster.”

Aggravated disbelief made the words thin. “Are you kriffing kidding me?”

“I’m a Jedi,” he said tersely. “No reason to." He closed his eyes. "Usually.”

He expected a sharp retort, but when he looked in her direction he saw Green Eyes sway. Her features in the glowrod light squeezed in a wince. He stepped towards her to reach for her elbow, again she skittered away. She hit the ground with a solid thump.

“Don’t touch me. You’re making everything worse,” she gritted out, before he could move to offer her a hand. She levered herself back up. “And get that karking light out of my face.”

She sounded fine, at least. “Where did the thing hit you? You think it used --”

“Does it kriffing matter?” she hissed at him.

“That blow -- it’s affecting you. You could have a concu--”

“Maybe you want to die buried down here, Jedi. Waiting around for that thing to come, kill you, and then tuck you in. I don’t. Shine the light up the corridor. Has to be a vent shaft around here. They place them near entryways.”

Feeling unwell make anyone overreact, Luke told himself. He swept the glowrod around the edges of the ceiling. Who knew how long she'd been trapped in that closet? “There.” Some grates came into view over some lockers. “But maybe you shouldn’t--”

His protest was cut off as she tested the shelves and called, “Light my way up.” She started scaling them. “You have some fusion cutters?” She called when she reached the top. “I’m going to have to cut the grates to get in.” 

Luke clipped the lit glowrod onto his belt and climbed up. Green Eyes moved back on the top of the unit to give him some room. “Here.” He reached into his belt and handed her the cutters. Once she had them, he trained the glowrod on the grates, watching her melt the sides. When she was done, she grabbed it by the middle and threw it down. He couldn’t really see the expression on her face, but there was something off about it that made him tense. For a second he imagined her kicking at him, shoving him off the shelves. 

In the next instant, she was disappearing into the vent, leaving him to wonder if he'd imagined it. This place was weighed down with negative energy. And maybe one didn't even have to be a Jedi to feel it. Add to that feeling hunted, and it was normal, within the circumstances, to feel on edge. Given that, her focus and quick-thinking was admirable. Luke made his way into the narrow space of the vent. This place was just clouding that with all its dark side reek.

“Give me your glowrod,” she called.

Luke paused. It didn’t feel like such a great idea. 

“I can’t see where I’m going,” she added. “Which means I can’t pick out where to drop down into.”

“Shouldn’t we check the map?” 

Moaning interrupted whatever reply Green Eyes was about to make. 

“What’s that?” Luke whispered. 

“I don’t know. That thing, maybe. Where is it on the map?”

He stopped and withdrew his datapad. There was no red spot. “I don’t see it there. Not anymore. Maybe it's someone.”

“Or it just conveniently dropped my stuff some other place and came back. Your glowrod.”

He put his datapad away. “They might need help.”

Another moan halted the discussion.

A few beats after, Green Eyes came back with, “You're not seriously suggesting taking the _only glowrod_ down there to willingly confront whatever creature is killing sentients down here?" 

He reached through the Force. "There's no danger. It could be someone el--"

“Fine," she cut him off. "Go first.” She loaded the next word with the sort of contempt he hadn’t heard in a good while, “hero.”

Another moan came from below them.

Luke shimmied ahead, trying for as much space as possible in the closed space of the ventilation shaft. For a second he was sure Green Eyes would attempt to rip the glowrod from his hands as he scooted past her. She didn’t, although the coiled tension and deep hostility around her continued to feel uncomfortable. The moaning continued, echoing strangely against the metal siding around them. Even without the Force's warning, every single one of his nerves was on high alert.

He’d been through worse, Luke reminded himself and activated his lightsaber to cut through the panel. He created a small opening, the duraplast hitting the floor with a dull sound. From the vent shaft he couldn’t see much, so he reached out with the Force again. A wavering presence registered through his awareness, but no danger he could sense then either. He concentrated harder and tried not to wonder if that oppressive dark feeling in the Force could be fogging up his awareness.

“Stay here,” he told Green Eyes, and before she could protest, he slid his legs into the opening, dropping down in a defensive crouch, deactivated lightsaber in hand. He clipped it back to his belt and pulled the glowrod out.

Cots lined up all around him. The whole room was about as big as the communal ‘fresher. Against the wall behind him, there was a counter and cabinets along with a washbasin. At the opposite end from where Luke stood was an individual cot with a privacy curtain pulled around it. It was lit, wan light bleeding through the sheet in a drowsy yellow.

Another moan rang out, clearly coming from there.

An infirmary? Had Green Eyes managed to hurt the creature? Had it been hurt when it attacked her? 

“Hello?” Luke called. “My name is Luke Skywalker.” He paused, waiting for a response. When there was none, he went on, “I’m a Jedi. I mean you no harm.” He moved towards the cot. 

There was a whoosh of air behind him and he turned to see Green Eyes get to her feet. She looked as if she were about to say something, but remained silent. Was she waiting for whatever was out there to attack him so she could take the glowrod?

Luke shook the thought off, and motioned for her to get back.

He continued approaching what was behind the privacy curtain cautiously. There was still no danger from the Force, but talking might make the being more comfortable. 

“Are you hurt?” he asked gently. “We can help you.”

He was right in front of the curtain, a vague form visible on the cot. “We don’t mean you any harm,” he continued. Did it even know Basic? He tried to project calmness into the words. “You sound like you’re hurting. I just want to check, okay? I’m going to pull the curtain back, okay?”

Luke raised his free hand and slowly pulled the curtain back. 

“Oh fuck,” Green Eyes said behind him.

On the cot lay a humanoid figure, small under several sheets, but alive. A child, by the looks of it, whose age and gender Luke couldn’t determine, emaciated as it they were. He drew on his awareness of the child and saw that it was a girl. How had he not sensed that she was here? Gingerly, he reached to her forehead, finding her body alarmingly hot to the touch. The Force only confirmed the illness wracking her body. He knew too little to heal her. Luke didn’t want to risk doing inadvertent harm, but if he could put himself in stasis, he could do it to someone else, and maybe---

“Skywalker, at your feet!” Green Eyes’ scream rang out just as his eyes flew open. Warning gushed through the Force. He barely jumped back in time to avoid a blue flame swiping at his feet. He drew another step back as hands emerged from underneath the cot, placed flat on the ground. They were linked to arms covered in a tattered jumpsuit, arms that spidered out, shoulders parallel to the ground. Hair, long and unkempt, streamed down as the figure crawled out towards Luke.

Human, he thought as a chill went down his spine -- surprise making him stumble over his feet and fall back. “Wait!”

Something came flying over his shoulder, distracting the figure. Luke dove forward, slapping the fusion cutter from his attacker’s hand and pinning the arm -- small, almost fragile -- back. “I don’t mean you harm!” he shouted over the figure’s struggles. It was much smaller than him, a child, too. “I’m a Jedi. Please stop. I’ll let you go once you stop, I promise.” He reached towards the thrashing -- boy. It was a boy. “I promise. I’ll let you go. Just don’t hurt me. We don’t mean you any harm.”

He let the child go, and he scrambled away back under the cot, snarling like a wild animal. 

“They’re children.” Green Eyes said, shaken. “Children.” 

Luke got to his feet as Green Eyes approached. “The girl -- she's sick. Very sick.”

“What’d you do to her?”

Luke’s eyebrows furrowed. Could Green Eyes...? “I put her in a trance,” he explained as he squatted down to look under the cot. The boy had wedged himself against the wall to the far end. Out of this forsaken place, without all the toxic aura, he was sure he would have sensed them quicker. 

“I don’t know how to heal her," he told Green Eyes, "but at least it shouldn’t get worse.” He called to the boy. “Hey! Is that your sister?” 

The boy hissed in response. 

“They might not know Basic,” Green Eyes said quietly. “They might not know any language at all. Who knows how long they’ve been here? They don’t seem...” her voice faded.

Luke stood and looked in her direction. She was clearly shaken, and while there was an outpouring of pity, there was something else he couldn’t discern. “You know when this place was last used?”

“I don't know...maybe about a decade ago.”

Human children hiding out at an Imperial detention center? Luke’s eyes widened. The way his lightsaber had shorted out -- Luke reached into the Force, searching for the boy. There. He couldn’t believe he hadn’t felt him before. Too much focus on one thing, he’d been told over and over, could blind you to others. Who knew how long the stories about a cthon had worked as a cover? Who knew how many others like them had been down here?

Luke focused on projecting goodwill towards the boy and repeated, “I mean you no harm. I want to help you.” He drew closer through the Force. “Who are you?"

The boy made a low, pained sound and the images came as a torrent. A tall girl, flaxen-haired, by a fire, touching his face, and the face of another girl sitting beside her. _No talk. Talk and they find us._ Keep Ina quiet. Bowls of starchpaste. Stunning armored rats with electric prods. _You skin them like this._ White uniforms and screaming. _We will see Mommy again. But now we hide. Quiet Ina._ Dark vents. _Dark is good. They can’t find us in the dark, even if we cry._ Sarida touches his face like Mommy. _We will see Mommy again._ Splashing in the water of the showers. Ina wastes too much. He forgot Mommy’s face. But not Sarida’s. Sarida is sleeping. _Take care of Ina._ Sarida is sleeping. She's been sleeping for a while. _You have to be brave, Osiri. I’ll tell Mommy you are brave._

Luke withdrew from the memories with a shuddering breath.

“What is it?” Green Eyes called behind him. 

“There were three,” he said thickly. “They escaped into the vents. The eldest must have been ten or eleven when they escaped. She took care of them.” He looked at the figure of the boy, silent in his corner under the cot. “Sarida. I think...that’s who we found. Couldn’t have been more than seventeen when she fell sick. Probably over a year ago, I'm not sure.” He drew a breath, shaking off the horror and the sorrow. “This is Ina, the youngest, probably eleven or so.” He directed himself to the boy, tamping on an ache in his chest. Fifteen standard years at most but he looked no older than ten. “You’re Osiri, right? I’m Luke. It’s safe up there now.”

The boy didn’t move, and Luke reached out to him with the Force again, sent him an image of blue skies broken up by cloudcutters. “Safer than here,” he told him, “Ina needs help. You have to find her help.”

Osiri made another low sound.

Luke reached out to him, inching forward. “You can be brave, Osiri. We have to find Ina help. No one will hurt you. I promise.”

A tense silence fell and then Osiri slowly scooted forward, holding his hand close to his chest. This close, the smell was noticeable. Burned skin.

“What is it?” Luke asked, restraining his alarm. Had the boy burned himself with the fusion cutter? “Let me see.”

Osiri didn’t exactly offer the hand, but he didn’t jerk away when Luke gently turned it. His palm looked gruesome, skin peeled, and Luke immediately closed his eyes. This he could do, at least, and he felt as the tissue reconstituted itself. The hand was unmarred when Luke opened his eyes. Through the strands of disheveled hair, the boy’s eyes were wide. Luke smiled at him. He impulsively stretched out a hand, brushing the boy’s hair back. A child's face looked back at him, unsmiling with layers of dirt caked on it. The interplay of fear and hope in the boy's eyes reverberated through the Force.

“If she’s that sick, we really have to go.” Green Eyes’ voice had the strain from before. "We have to go now."

“We’re all going.” Luke gently pulled away. “First, we need you to open all the doors back up, okay? You can do that.” He stood up, pulling the boy along with him. “Come on.” He looked to Green Eyes’ form. “Can you take the girl and the extra glowrod?”

The boy suddenly pulled away hissing. Luke caught him before he could fling himself at Green Eyes. He must have thought she was a threat -- his encounter with her hadn’t dispelled it. “Hey, hey!” Luke raised his voice slightly. “She won’t hurt Ina. She’s taking her with us. Osiri! Osiri! Stop! It was a misunderstanding. She thought you meant her harm, but she doesn't--”

The boy didn’t listen. He hadn't stopped snarling and reaching for Green Eyes, and Luke called out to her. “Give Ina to me then.” Looking down at Osiri, he said, “I’ll carry her okay? Now, go open the doors. We have to get help for Ina.” 

He reached towards Green Eyes, who passed him the girl. She weighed nearly nothing. Osiri had taken one look back, then went to the access pad. A few moments later, the door opened. 

Green Eyes had the glowrod with the yellow light in hand, and if other matters had not been crowding for attention, he’d wonder at her change in demeanor, torn between shell-shocked and disturbed.

Osiri hurried down the hall with them behind him. “Same level,” he caught Green Eyes mumbling as they reached the stairwell at the end of the corridor. 

“You recognize it?”

“As much as you can recognize anything by glowrod light,” she retorted, her words sounding more tight than snappish.

“Your head--”

“Fine. How is she?”

“She'll be out until we get to a medcenter,” he said. “I don't know more than that.”

He had no longer finished saying the words than the ground shook. Earthquake? Green Eyes cursed. They’d just reached the landing and darted behind the boy who input another code on the door in front of them. It opened, but Osiri drew back, fear pouring off him, covering his face against the orange glare of the outside. Was this a back door? Luke could only see a nondescript passage before them. He drew out the map one handed, but nothing made sense.

"It wouldn't be there," Green Eyes said, walking forward. "This area wouldn't be on the map."

Luke wanted to ask why and how she knew, but other things to precedence. He pulled on the Osiri's arm gently. “We have to go,” he reminded him. It was likely he’d been warned over and over not to leave the facility. For him to do so now with strangers was almost too much to ask. “Ina needs help.”

The boy appeared to look behind them in Green Eyes’ direction. “She won’t hurt you. It was a mistake. You just startled her. She doesn’t mean you any harm.”

Green Eyes stopped a few paces. “I don’t,” she spoke up with an oddly jittery voice. "We have to go."

“You see?” Shifting the sick girl on his shoulder a bit, Luke reached for Osiri’s hand and pulled him along and into the passage. “You're familiar with this route?”

"Yeah," Green Eyes pushed out. "It's the only one I know out." Under the orange lights, he could make her face out more clearly despite the grime on her. Her features were sharp, a stern mouth, eyebrows thin and high-arched, her dark hair pulled back into a tight braid.

Her eyes flickered up. “Has to be past this.”

"Has to be?" That didn't sound so certain. "Osiri?" Luke called to the boy who was staring around him as if it were a different world. “You remember any turbolifts?” But he already knew the boy wouldn’t, not with any detail. He couldn’t have been older than five when he’d been brought in. 

The ground shook again and Luke tightened his hold on Ina. "What's all that shaking?"

"Something going on above us!" Green Eyes replied.

He could use more specifics, Luke thought, shifting his hold on Ina again as he rushed behind her, Osiri beside him. If his comm worked down here, he could comm Han and see if his friend could have help for Ina ready, but any signal down here had a snowball’s chance in Tatooine to making it to the upper levels -- even if he could spare the time to stop and input Han’s code.

The boy beside him was panting, his fear knife-sharp.

“We’ll be fine,” Luke told him. 

“Over here!” Green Eyes called excitedly and Luke pressed on. The turbolift was there, open and ready, just as the ground shook again. He and the boy jumped in and Green Eyes hit the button.

“What do you think is happening upstairs?” Luke asked her.

She was silent for a beat. “I don’t know exactly.” It sounded like an evasion, and the ground shook again, the turbolift car lurching to one side. Osiri made a panicked noise as the impact flung him to Green Eyes. She hit the turbolift wall with a thud, the shudder of the car making the boy cry out again, clutching her hips.

“It’s okay!” Luke called over the wailing metal as he met Green Eyes’ gaze. She was bracing herself against the wall, upright, but visibly ill at ease with the child. "Portals are solid, right?"

“I don’t like this,” Luke heard her mutter as if she hadn't heard him. "Some sort of work. This area's not that stable. Too much corrosive use, and if the cables--"

Osiri's eyes were large and frightened and Luke stopped her, before the boy could get more distressed. “At least that means someone’s up there right? If they're working up there.” Green Eyes’ posture blared her skepticism, but Luke continued, “They can help.”

The turbolift shook again, hitting the wall of the shaft hard, then plummeted a few stories before resuming its ascent. Osiri cried out. 

“Kriff this.” Green Eyes untangled herself from the boy enough to reach forward to the turbolift’s panel. "You have to _be_ alive to get help."

“Wait no-- what are you--”

She hit the emergency stop, and grabbed his lightsaber off his belt. Luke had no time to react as she pushed Osiri away, activated the lightsaber and sliced through the turbolift wall, smashing her boot at the durateel until it fell from the opening she'd carved. She deactivated it, slipped it away and brought out the glowrod to her wrist. The turbolift car swung back as she clipped it to her wrist.

Green Eyes swept the beam to the dark opening, barking out, “Pit ladder’s over there. We climb now. Go!” She yanked Osiri in front of her, once the car was nearing the wall with the ladder. She pushed the boy through the opening and he grabbed onto the nearest rung before the turbolift swung back. 

Luke tapped into the Force to keep a one-armed hold on the girl on his chest while keeping himself upright. Green Eyes brace herself against the back of the car. He didn’t have time to question her. The Force was blaring alarm. “Go, Osiri!” he called out. 

The as the turbolift car pendulumed and smashed into the opposite side of the shaft. 

“Keep going! Up!” Luke yelled to the boy, hoping he could hear him. He turned to Green Eyes as the turbolift hit the side where Osiri had exited from.

“You-- wait what are you--” Green Eyes said when Luke shoved Ina at her. Without her, he’d have more focus on steadying the turbolift, allowing Green Eyes to escape the car. He reached for the Force.

“Hurry,” Luke told her as she hesitated for an instant before firming her hold on the unconscious girl half slung over her shoulder. 

“You’re --” A bang from above forced her to break off, and she darted out to the ladder, easily clearing the small jump while Luke kept his hold on the car with the Force. He was about to go next when another louder bang from above ripped through his concentration. The turbolift swung back again. The impact, when it came, threw him down. He could hear Green Eyes screaming something outside, but couldn’t make it out amid the crunch of duracrete and metal. He stood getting his glowrod out to clip it to his wrist.

His turn to get out. The ladder wasn’t hard to hit, and he got a good hold on on of the rungs. Green Eyes was maybe a meter above him. He couldn't see past her to where Osiri was. The shaking in the cables above threw turbolift from side to side.

“How are you doing with her?” Luke called up to her. “Can you see Osiri?”

“I see him. Doing fine.” While he couldn’t see Osiri, he saw a shadowy maintenance platform, maybe nine meters away. 

"The girl?" He registered Green Eyes was doing her climb one-handed. Not an easy task with the girl's weight, and if the headache -- "You need any--" 

“Doing fine with her too. We have to keep moving.”

The ladder shook, vibrated, beneath his hands. Luke stared down as the turbolift swung back and forth. Something small pelted him and lowered his face.

“Careful with debris!” Green Eyes screamed out before he could. “Osiri! Close to the wall!”

The turbolift smashed into the wall again. Luke heard a small cry of surprise from above, and a flash of panic.

“Osiri!” he called out, reaching out with the Force in case the boy had slipped, but it didn't feel like he had, the feeling quickly fading.

“Close to the wall!” Green Eyes’ voice rose through the shaft. “Okay, go! Go now!”

There was a brief lull, the shaking not as intense, and they climbed as fast as they could. Metal made a grinding noise all around them, and bits of duraplast rained down on Luke. He clung as close to the wall as he could while he climbed. The maintenance platform above them was too far away still. 

A yelp rose in the air.

“Osiri!” He shouted.

“He’s okay. Slipped again, but got his hold back.” Green Eyes directed herself at the boy above her: “When I say hug the kriffing wall,” there was a dangerous deliberateness in her next words, but Luke could feel that it was masking real concern. “You. Hug. The. Wall? Got it? Get back up there.” 

They braved several more shakes, the climb tiring them out as they inched their way up. He could feel Osiri weighed with apprehension, and Green Eyes' determination. She seemed to be okay with Ina for the moment.

But for how long? Luke glanced at the swinging turbolift below. If it kept crashing into the walls that hard, it would continue to pose a danger to Osiri’s grip or Green Eyes’ -- she was doing a one-handed climb after all. Too risky. Luke reached for his lightsaber. He didn’t have it. Green Eyes--

Another shake, followed by the crashing of the turbolift.

Luke raised his head. “Green Eyes? I need my lightsaber back.”

Her voice came back to him with a strained, “Now?” 

“That turbolift is dangerous. I don’t want it to make Osiri fall.”

"So you're just going to what? Cut it loose?"

"Yeah."

He had the impression she was poised to argue when it slammed into the side again and the rungs vibrated. “It’s in my pocket," she said quickly. "But with the girl, I don’t have the hands for it.”

“It’s okay.” He thought he could see it now, a glint by her hip. “I’m going to use the Force to take it. Just...don’t get startled.” 

Stretching to the Force he drew it out, lifted it to the center of the shaft where the cables were. With a _snap-hiss_ , the blade shot out. He swept it through the cables at the center of the shaft using the Force. The turbolift went down the abyss. Luke closed the lightsaber and drew it to his outstretched hand, clipping it back onto his belt. The shaking continued, but felt less immediate.

They climbed up for a bit before he asked, “What do you think is there? All the shaking? Construction?”

A few beats of a pause. “Demolition.”

“I thought no one used the Works.”

“They don’t. This isn’t -- it’s not normal." Something heavy lurked under her words. "Tagg Co. has been putting off the clean-up of this area for years. It's dangerous up there right now.” 

“Why?

“Waste reclamation procedures. It starts with dosing up the place with Pholoxide to get rid of vermin. That’s why construction droids are the ones to do it. If I had known...”

“How could you have known? How toxic is it?” He wasn’t too confident in his abilities to deal with poison, but he should be able to manage given the severity of the situation.

She made a strangled sound from deep in her throat. It might have been a bitter laugh. By then they'd gotten to the maintenance platform. Green Eyes waited as he climbed up and checked on Osiri. Turning to her, he reached for Ina. Osiri's eyes on them as they completed the switchover. Green Eyes had to be exhausted. "Let's rest and then figure things out," Luke told her.

But Green Eyes shook her head. "I'm going to get help."

“You just said it was toxic. And you--”

“I’ll be fine.” Lie. “Headaches gone." Another lie. "Besides I know where to go. You don’t. The fumes aren't lethal if it's less than a few hours of direct inhalation anyway, we just shouldn’t be exposing them to it. The platform being underneath the doors is some protection.”

Luke wanted to stop her, but Osiri moving towards him made him hold his tongue. The boy stopped just a few steps away from Green Eyes.

She was right, Luke thought grudgingly. He didn’t know the area. This was a different turbolift than the one he’d come down in.

Her hand swooped down. He was ready this time and even with his right arm around Ina, he easily caught Green Eyes’ wrist with his left before she could grab his lightsaber. “Don't do that.”

She cocked her head. Some of her earlier animosity was back when she said, “You have better ideas of how to get through durasteel?”

 _You could ask_ , Luke almost said, but was derailed by the effortless flick of her wrist when she’d activated the blade and cut through the turbolift car. A novice would have trouble adjusting to the relative lightness of a lightsaber, and the fact that its balance point is deeply within a wielder's grip. “You've handled a lightsaber before.” 

“Got one to you, didn't I?” Green Eyes tried to pull her wrist away.

Oh. In the whole mess, he’d forgotten about the _other_ lightsaber. He let her wrist go, and balanced Ina's weight with both hands. “Not what I meant.” Even under the circumstances, the reminder sparked his curiosity. Green Eyes clearly wasn’t a Jedi but… “Did you know any Jedi before? That’s why I wanted to meet you. The lightsaber, I mean. I would -- I would pay for any information. Later, of course.”

She let out a humorless laugh, bordering a scoff, but he had no choice but to let go. Green Eyes swiped the lightsaber from his belt clip. 

“You’ll get it back.” She spoke in a light, casual tone, already climbing up the ladder, and he spied some posturing in the next. “I don't make a habit of taking things from the living.”

He grimaced, despite the calculation lurking under the words. That was an awful way of putting it. 

Luke went to Osiri who was sitting against the wall. He put a hand on the boy’s shoulder and squeezed. “She’s going to get help,” he told him. “We’re going to wait here.” Osiri flinched when he heard the _snap-hiss_ of the blade activating. “That’s just her cutting through the door.”

He lost track of time, simply sat beside Osiri, their backs to the wall. The boy stared at his sister, a feeling of acute loneliness welling up, and Luke closed his eyes, summoning the image of a forest path. Spindly trees, trunks a reddish-brown and lush, deep-green crowns with elegant boughs. He pushed the image to the despondent boy. Osiri startled.

“It’s a park. Not to far from here,” Luke told him softly. “You’ll be able to take Ina there when she’s better.”

The boy stayed silent, but a bit of wonder trickled out from him. Could Osiri speak at all, did he just not want to? Had something else happened to the children during their time in isolation? Had something happened before?

The boy tentatively nudged Luke for more, starting to get curious about the world above. Luke pushed his own questions aside.

In his mind, he drew the spires of the Imperial Palace and the ziggurat of the main structure. It had been a Jedi Temple before the empire corrupted it, but its beauty had endured A symbol of what it had once been, and, Luke reflected, what it could be again. He thought of the center of the palace, the wide open area where he’d planted the two seeds of the uneti trees earlier that year so that another Great Tree could bloom again. A peaceful place.

“You can bring her there too. Soon there will be trees. It’s safe.” Luke caught how the boy’s eyes were fixed on his sister in Luke’s arms. “You’ll both be safe. Ina will be okay.”

He showed Osiri the blue of a clear afternoon sky and the deep purple of twilight, lit by endless speeder lights all along the spacelanes above. 

Maybe he’d been thinking of his time in Coruscant from the wrong angle. He’d gotten so caught up in digging for the past, overwhelmed by it to the point that he’d felt stuck. Desperate. Luke cradled Ina in his arms, arranging her more comfortably, aware of Osiri beside him. Being a Jedi wasn’t about history or techniques. It wasn’t about lightsabers or holocrons.

Too much focus on one thing could blind you to others. He might have needed the reminder.

“You won’t be alone,” Luke told the boy quietly. “Others hidden away like you and Ina. They’ll come out, too. It’s safe now.” 

Wary still, Osiri’s feeling could be best described as a nudge. _Show me more_?

Luke was painting the view from the Imperial Palace’s central spire when there was a screech of metal, followed by a voice through a vocoder.

“Hello? Anyone here?”

Osiri gasped. 

“Safe,” Luke told him, looking up at a flash of red light reflected from the opposite wall of the turbolift shaft. “That’s help.” He urged the boy up. “We’re here! He arranged Ina across his shoulder and started the climb to the doors where a bulky figure in a hazmat suit waited to help him out. 

Luke emerged to a dusty, hazy landscape through the lightsaber cut-open doors of the turbolift. His throat began itching almost immediately, and he coughed as he handed Ina to the figure who immediately placed a mask on her. 

“She needs medical attention,” Luke said, gesturing to the girl between coughs. “She’s in a trance. She’s sick, felt like she had a fever. I don’t know what she has.”

“We’ll bring her to a medcenter, sir,” the figure told him, lifting Ina as he lead Luke out, other figures in yellow stepping aside. He thought his guide might be Mirialan, but his vision was kind of fuzzy. 

Luke turned to Osiri out, hearing him coughing behind him. The figure tried to place a mask on him, but the boy struggled until Luke intervened.

The being in yellow handed Luke a breathing mask, and started talking into his comm. “I found them. Repeat. I found them. All set to get them in for decon. See what their levels are." The figure turned to Luke. "Jedi Skywalker, are you alright?”

Luke nodded. He felt a little lightheaded, but used the Force to clear his head. Scanning around, he could see little other than clouds of dust and murky beams of lights flashing through them. He slipped the mask on. Where was Green Eyes? 

“The woman?” he asked.

The ground shook and an enormous metal foot stomped on the ground several yards away. Luke’s spine locked, the memory of an AT-AT’s hydraulic legs popping into his mind. No, this was an EVS construction droid. Just as large, vaguely insectoid, with a bulbous abdomen, dark in the clouds of dust. It called to mind a beetle with two grasping pincer arms. Osiri gasped and drew nearer to Luke. He sent him as much calm as he could. The droid’s mechanical whirr screamed as its head moved in another direction, debris from the construction site crunching loudly under its footfalls.

“What woman?” the figure replied.

“The one who told you about us.”

“You all will be taken to the nearest medcenter,” the figure said appeasingly, without answering his questions, “but you need to go through decontamination first. The levels of Pholoxide amilase here are hazardous to most species.”

“The boy isn’t familiar with any of this. We don’t even know if he can talk--” Luke stopped walking.

“Do you know the children’s guardians?” The figure pulled at his arm to urge him along.

Luke didn’t move. “No--”

“We will look for them. Please, sir. Time is--”

“He was in the lower levels with his sister. Where’s the woman? The one who approached you?”

“I’m sorry,” the figure said. “I don’t know, but I can ask around. For now the priority is decontamination. The children.”

Luke blinked. Right. He shook his head against the lightheadedness spreading in his skull.

“After that we can track down any other members of your party.” The figure gestured him along, carrying Ina in his arms. Luke gave one last look around and pulled Osiri along.

\--

“They’re doing well so far. Ina's still on antibiotics. None of the three children had any records though,” Luke told his sister a few mornings later outside of the children’s ward where he’d begun spending most of his days. Given the circumstances, he’d been allowed to stay near them for as long as it would take to ease them into their new life. The trips between medcenter and Imperial Palace had been so annoying in city traffic that Luke had been grateful when he’d been cleared to stay there with them. Probably his sister’s doing, and maybe a couple of sympathetic nurses.

“The caseworker said they see this all the time,” he continued. “Their parents might have been in hiding. The last records we have are Imperial records, and they’re far from complete, especially for anyone who went underground. They’ll start them up on counseling and see if they can find a home for them both. I’m familiar to them, so I’ll stick around until they’re in a stable situation.” He flashed her a smile. “Thanks for that by the way.” 

Leia chuckled. “What? For getting them to let you move into a medcenter? I never thought I’d see the day,” she teased, but grew more serious. “I messaged a couple of contacts from the Alderaanian Council familiar with refugee work this morning. I’m waiting for them to get back to me. They’ll have some more ideas of how to help the children transition. Has...Osiri told you more?” 

Luke shook his head. “I haven’t pressed, to be honest. I can’t even imagine what they’ve been through. The minders say it’s best to proceed with caution.”

“I know,” Leia said quietly. “For them to have spent so many years alone in that place.”

Luke let the silence hang for a few beats. He lowered his voice as he continued, “I keep thinking that detention center had to be a waypoint. The Emperor would round up whoever was found to have some Force sensitivity and send them elsewhere. Maybe their parents are still out there, looking for them.” He rubbed at his face. “I hope they are.” He fell silent once more. After a few moments he ventured, “Anything about the woman?”

Leia shook her head. “Nothing. Everyone I've talked to says the packaging was too carefully done. It's untraceable.”

Luke bit his lip. A package had arrived to Luke's place a couple of days after the rescue, but having been busy consulting with experts about the children and dealing with other matters related to them, he hadn't been there to receive it. 

"I tried contacting medcenters around the area, see if anyone was brought in that day," Leia continued. "But privacy laws prevent them from releasing information about patients. We're stonewalled there too."

Luke had put a comm to Hizoo, but he’d been unable to catch the broker before he was sucked in by something else related to the children. 

"I guess she really doesn't want to be found," Leia summed up.

"She risked her life to go alone for help," Luke protested. "Feels wrong not to at least thank her."

"Well, you know she's okay. Maybe letting her disappear is thanks enough," she mused.

Luke had little time to mull over it within the whirlwind of activity with more and more specialists. While Luke tried to keep the media away from the ward where Osiri and Ina were being treated, there were always beings filtering in who needed to be reminded about boundaries. Luke hoped that once things settled, he could check in with Hizoo and persuade the broker to give him Green Eyes’ real name. He hadn't had time to see whether the broker had responded or not, especially because the hectic schedule of visits and consultations showed no sign of letting up. In a happy development amidst all the upheaval, Ina had regained consciousness.

Some time after that, in one of those rare chunks of time Luke carved out to go through his ever-increasing pile of messages, he happened on one from an odd code. It lay under mountain of unknown comm codes -- probably media people. The identificator on this one though marked it as Selar Spaceport. It wasn't where he kept his X-wing. Luke clicked on the message.

“This is an urgent message regarding Shuttle Antarra, owner listed as Skywalker, L. in docking bay three-four-zero-two of Selar Spaceport. Please return our comm call to this number as soon as possible. Repeat. This is an urgent message. Your prompt response is required.”

Luke frowned. He hadn’t thought about the shuttle he’d commandeered from the Death Star since he’d had Hobbie bring it over from Home One when he’d first moved to Coruscant.

He input the code and waited for the line to connect. “Selar Spaceport Security.”

Luke blinked. Why was Selar's Spaceport Sec calling him? 

“This is Skywalker. I received a message about a shuttle--”

“Shuttle Antarra,” the voice was pained. “I’m afraid we’ve had a bit of a situation, Mr. Skywalker.”

He felt himself stiffen. “What sort of situation?”

“It seems that Shuttle Antarra was cleared for departure at oh seven hundred. It was cleared--”

“That doesn’t make sense,” Luke interrupted, confused. Someone had taken the shuttle two hours ago? No one but him and Hobbie were on the list -- and Hobbie was offplanet. “You would need codes for that. My codes.”

“There were codes.” the being replied. “They checked out, sir. At the time. It wasn’t until an hour ago that we realized that the proxy code for a Ms. Chiara Pradeux was never given. Everything else was exactly as the system required.” The words picked up speed. “We should have been more vigilant, but this sort of thing rarely happens here. Thieves blunt-force docking clamps, they don’t walk right in with legitimate codes. For an Imperial Lambda, no less.”

Luke didn’t reply, his mind going over the information. He barely remembered owning that shuttle on most days. How could anyone know he had that shuttle, much less where it was, along with the codes to steal it?

“We’ve put out an All Ports Warning, so we’re confident she’ll turn up, but sir, it is paramount that you verify all your personal devices. The codes are legitimate,” the being repeated. 

It dawned on him right then. The mapping software. He’d sync’ed it onto his datapad. His datapad. Oh, kriff.

“There is a high likelihood you have a security breach, sir.”

 _Of course_ , he had a security breach. Luke quickly thanked the being on the line and closed it. He punched in Hizoo’s code. 

“I didn’t do it,” the Weequay blurted out by way of greeting, clearly having been waiting for Luke's comm. “Whatever it is. I wouldn’t kriff with a Jedi. Everyone knows what happens when you do, and--and I warned you! You didn’t--”

“You stole all my information!” Luke thundered at him. “My personal information!”

“I didn’t! It’s an automatic function of the program! Okay, okay sometimes we get creative, but it’s just insurance most of the time! You know, so we make sure our clients pay. You have no idea what some of the beings I deal with are like. They are not Jedi, I tell you--”

“ _Hizoo_ ,” he cut him off warningly.

“It’s her! Green Eyes! It was a fraggin' set up. She'd routed the feed to her own devices from the beginning. I didn't know. I deleted mine! I told you I wouldn’t kriff with a Jedi. It’s bad for business, lethal eve--”

“You could have warned me!”

“I did as soon as I realized it! Check your messages!”

The unfamiliar comm codes. Luke’s anger was replaced by irritation at himself, at the whole situation. He would have to change all his passwords, all his account numbers. She could be cleaning out his bank account right now. 

“It’s her then,” he settled himself. One thing at a time. “Chiara Pradeaux. She stole a ship of mine. They put out an All Ports on her.”

“Who? Green Eyes? No. That’s not her name, and an APW won’t help. If she’s smart, she’s going long trip past Mid Rim, probably dumping the ship as soon as she can to sell it for parts. Use the credits to grab something untraceable, then Quay knows where she’s going.”

“What’s her name?” Luke bit out. What a headache. On top of everything else.

“It’s Lorn,” Hizoo said without pause. “Arica Lorn. I’ll see if my people turn up anything on her that’s helpful.”

It felt bitter to thank Hizoo, but Luke did it anyway.

Hizoo commed back two days later, urgency crackling from the line. “I have something you need to see.” He gave Luke an address to meet him at and a time.

Luke felt he had little choice. Cleaning up the mess this Arica Lorn had made was proving an even more aggravating task than he’d thought. His bank accounts had security settings on them, so she hadn’t been able to clean him out, but she’d tried. She’d also changed a significant number of his passwords, requiring him to contact all the entities in question personally to reset them, not to mention reset the rest just in case. He'd had to enlist a couple of Leia's aides to help with the administrative overhead given his duties with the children.

And even that hadn’t been all. Over the next days, Luke had suddenly found himself bombarded with weird messages, which led him to think this Arica had published his personal contact information at unsavory places. Advertisements for all manner of unnecessary, embarrassing and frankly bizarre wares flooded his personal correspondence. Between chortles, the New Republic comm tech he’d asked to help him with his disaster of an inbox had said it looked like she’d given all his information out to third parties without using the automated program most scam slicers used. She'd done it _manually_ , which meant no counter program could remove him automatically from all those lists.

“Better change your address and start over,” the tech had counseled. “Otherwise good luck finding anything under the heaps of ads for,” he stopped to read, “Gamorrean pleasure enhancements.” He'd chortled some more.

Luke had been and continued to be far from amused, and maybe that was why Hizoo looked fidgety when Luke showed up at the cantina he'd set as the meet location. Two Trandoshans sat nearby, clearly bodyguards. Luke gestured to them offhandedly and rolled his eyes at Hizoo.

“Really,” he said flatly.

Hizoo smiled tightly and shifted in his seat. He forced a laugh. “You have to know,” he began. “My associates, we screen them, of course, but the type of business we run--”

“Can you just give me what you have?” Luke interrupted.

“Yes! Yes.” He passed Luke a datacube. “We tracked down Lorn's place. Found it smashed up to bits, mirrors and everything. A total wreck. Maybe she owed someone credits. Peeved up slumlord says he saw no one but her go in and one, but that's nothing new. But we--we found this on her bed. Thought whoever totalled the place left it as a warning, but...Anyway, if she turns up we will take any measures you decide--”

Luke furrowed his brow at him. What? “No. No measures. If you get any more information,” he told him firmly, “you come directly to me. Are we clear?”

Hizoo gave him another awkward smile, panic nearly dripping off of him. “Yes.”

“What is this anyway?” Luke lifted the datacube.

A tittering laugh broke from the Weequay. “Sensitive. I think you should see it alone.”

The broker was telling the truth, but his level of nervousness was more than peculiar. What was in the cube?

“Goes without saying, my organization will offer any help in finding her. I already sent out word to my...colleagues in other parts of the city. If she ever steps foot on Coruscant again, we’ll know. And you’ll know about any other Jedi material we find.” Another wide smile and a burst of panic in Hizoo’s sense. “No charge, of course. Ever.”

Luke stared at him quizzically. The broker looked down at the datacube. What could elicit this kind of reaction? “Did she hurt anyone?”

“No! No,” he said emphatically. “Thank Quay. No.” He let out another awkward laugh.

“All right.” Luke stood and Hizoo jumped up.

“We have nothing to do with this,” he announced, grabbing Luke's sleeve. “We didn’t know.”

Luke flashed him another odd look. “I know that.”

Hizoo’s eyes widened. “You do?” He seemed to catch himself. “Right. Jedi, yes.”

“It’s fine, Hizoo,” Luke told him wearily, slipping the datacube into his tunic. “Just let me know if anything else comes up.”

After he’d left Hizoo, Luke met Han over at his docking bay where Han was tinkering with the Falcon and caught him up on the latest on the children. Soon enough the topic turned to Hizoo's weirdness.

“I told you these broker types are slimy. I’d say it was all a mistake, but at least you found the kids.” Han gave a shrug as they walked into the Falcon’s lounge area. “So what’s in the cube?”

“All my info, I guess,” Luke said with a sigh, leaning back into the booth. 

Han chuckled. “You still getting that Gamorrean--”

Luke made an exasperated noise. “I don’t want to talk about it. I had to change all my addresses and account numbers. All of them!” He made a face. “I mean, I know some people don’t want to be found, but it’s excessive and petty. She’d already stolen from me.”

“Not as fun as hittin' you where it hurts.” Han chuckled. “Might as well take a look, though.” He jerked his chin in the cube’s direction. “See if you missed anything else.”

“I guess.” Luke’s shoulders slumped as he activated it, and a folder popped up before them. Luke tapped the cube for it to open and found several subfolders, sorted ascending by date. He tapped the first one, and a HoloNet article on the Bakura Campaign appeared. He tapped the next file. More about the Bakura Campaign. He left the subfolder and tried another, going chronologically. An article on the Liberation of Coruscant.

Luke put his hand on his chin and looked over at Han. “News?”

Han reached over and navigated to another folder with holovid files, also arranged by date. Luke’s own likeness came up: an interview he’d done shortly after the Bakura Campaign. The next file was another interview with him about the renovations of the Imperial Palace. Then one about some minor dispute Leia had brought him in on as arbitrator.

“Those weren’t just articles. They were all about you. So’s all this. From a while back.” Han’s eyebrows were raised. “Maybe it’s a thief’s cachet thing," he said by way of explanation. "Stealing from a Jedi. Messin’ with him just ‘cause you can." He nodded, amusement seeping out of him. "Don't see _that_ often. She’s got guts.”

Luke cocked his head and leaned forward to look through another folder, also sorted by date. A holo image-- of him. Luke’s eyes widened. One of his first meetings with Hizoo, just outside that dirty cantina the broker liked. But there were other holos -- of him leaving the place, of him grabbing a bite to eat at a random tapcafe in the Senate district before going home. 

Luke tensed and quickly tried another folder. The next set of holos were taken in the corridors of the Senate building: him walking with two senators, his lunch meeting with a couple of political aides. There even was a holo shot through a window, showing him at Leia’s office as they pored over documents.

Han didn’t sound so amused anymore after that one. “This is a little…” He didn’t finish the thought and Luke tapped another folder, one without a date. 

Schematics for a weapon. A blaster? He tapped on the next file. 

A holovid demonstration. Target practice? A Twi’lek male raised a blaster to the target, but instead of a bolt four darts shot out. They sparked brightly as they made contact with the target.

 _And it took my things_ , she’d said about Osiri.

“That’s a flechette pistol.” An edge had crept into Han’s voice. “Real...specialized.”

Luke barely heard him as he scanned through more files. More holos of him popped up, another meeting with Hizoo, having a drink at some cantina with Wedge, entering the gym -- all were from last month. The next folder held maps of the Senate building, the gym. He tapped the next file. A detailed schedule came up. His schedule. The date was two weeks ago. A chill crept down his spine as he looked over at Han. His friend had gone pale.

“I didn’t feel anyone tailing me,” Luke told him.

Han licked his lips. “Probably hung back. Had to, right? Zoomed in with whatever tech she used.”

Luke tapped on another file. A map. Luke gasped. The corridor, the location of the stairwells, cells, an infirmary, communal 'freshers -- 

“What?” Han asked, alarmed.

It was a map of the detention center.

“That’s where we were. Where we found the children.” Luke scrutinized the map with a weird feeling. Her hostility, those morbid feelings he’d chalked up to the place.

Luke opened the next file. Official government documents on urban renewal. Scheduled demolitions. One date was highlighted. She’d known -- and the children. He felt a surge of anger. She’d put them in danger.

 _It starts with dosing the place with Pholoxide to get rid of vermin. That’s why construction droids are the ones to do it_ , she’d said. _If I had known…_

She’d been shocked. Guilt-wracked. That’s why she’d risked her life.

"I don’t think they were part of her plan," Luke murmured. Where had she gotten the lightsaber?

Han tapped on the next holo image. “This is the most recent one. Few days after you got the kids.”

Who was she?

 _Thought whoever totalled the place left it as a warning,_ Hizoo had said. It wasn't. Not a warning.

A desk -- his desk -- and on it glittering debris. Broken glass?

Luke’s stomach sank. He hadn’t sat down in his office since his trip to the Works. He’d been busy with the children, spending most of his time at the medcenter, but he must have passed in front of the sight of the image more than once without noticing. Another chill went down his spine at the ensuing realization. She’d known where he lived...and she’d known how to sneak in unseen, unnoticed.

“That your desk?” Han interrupted his thoughts. “Wait, what's that on it?”

Luke’s hand went to his lightsaber and he opened the hilt. His crystal was missing. Or, more accurately, the image showed where it was. What was left of it.

It was a statement, and born out of something personal, much deeper than pettiness. Darker.

If Luke just knew _why_.

“What the hell?” Han blurted out. 

“No,” Luke swallowed, looking at the crushed holographic shards of his lightsaber’s crystal, “I don’t think finding the kids was part of her plan at all.”

**Author's Note:**

> The prompts were: exploring abandoned buildings, basement, shroud, and fever. Add this one in as another bizarre 'how I met your mother' story. bwahaha.


End file.
